And the Rest Is History(104)

I opened my mouth to shout a warning but it was too late.

I had the briefest glimpse of Leon, visor up, white faced, among a throng of Time Police, and then the wall sagged.

Two men seized Leon by the straps on his armour and dragged him out of the way, bumping him over the rough ground. The medical team threw themselves sideways. Captain Ellis lost his balance and fell. Without even thinking – I have to stop doing that – I threw myself over his upper body.

I don’t know what hit me. I only know that it was heavy. Wood or stone – something struck me a massive blow between my shoulder blades, driving all the breath from my body.

I lay, face down over Matthew Ellis, completely unable to move. Frightened thoughts scampered through my brain. Was I paralysed? Had I sustained some dreadful injury to my spine?

A muffled voice said, ‘You just can’t stop saving my life, can you?

Someone shouted. The weight was lifted. Someone gently rolled me over. I remember I cried out in pain.

There was a babble of voices.

‘We need to get out of here now. The whole lot could come down at any moment.’

‘Stretcher. Bring up another stretcher.’

‘We only have four, sir.’

‘Well, we can’t leave her here and she can’t walk so think of something.’

At that moment, I couldn’t have cared less if they’d gone off and left me. I was in so much pain I could hardly think straight. I tried to tell myself this was a good thing. The pain showed that things were still working. Just a little less pain would have been good though. Everything hurt. My ribs, my back, my front, my inside, my outside. Everything. A thick, hot, never-ending pain radiated outwards, sitting heavily over my heart like a lump of red-hot lead. I had no idea about broken bones but I certainly had extensive soft-tissue trauma. My back felt as if it was on fire and I had pins and needles in my hands and feet. I wondered whether, if I hadn’t been wearing armour, I would be dead.

Someone said, ‘Can she stand?’

‘Not a chance.’

They were fitting me with a neck brace and, from what I could see at ground level, they were improvising a stretcher from a broken door. Everyone worked quickly and efficiently. I felt comforted.

We set off for the pod. I assumed the others had gone on ahead with Leon and I still didn’t know if he was alive or dead. Then there was Guthrie, with his terrible wounds, and Markham, covered in blood. And I hadn’t even seen Van Owen.

I lay on my side and tried to grip the edge of the door, feeling it tip and tilt as they scrambled over the uneven surfaces, up and down steps, around corners. I lay still, lost in my own little pile of pain

I was pleased to see everyone else had proper stretchers – canvas between light tubular poles. The poor sods with my heavy wooden door had definitely drawn the short straw. I had a horrible feeling the officer on the front right-hand corner was the one whose thumb I’d dislocated last year. It was probably best not to mention that now.

The journey back seemed endless although they told me afterwards that our return trip was considerably quicker than our outgoing trip. Everyone just put their heads down and ran. The security teams ranged around us, shouting and waving their guns at anyone stupid enough to get close to us. Not many did. There was enough going on in Constantinople that day without taking on nausea-inducing black-clad strangers as well.

They did their best, but speed does not mean comfort. I think the others were unconscious, but I was wide awake for every bone-jolting moment of it. Ellis ran alongside, saying, ‘Sorry, Max. Just hang on,’ every now and then. They were all doing their best, so I stifled my groans, did as I was told, and hung on.

And then, just as I thought we’d made it – just when we were within sight of the pod, I heard a shout and my team ground to a halt.

One or two men appeared from a wrecked building. I could hear more men shouting and laughing. Someone inside was screaming. My group was at the rear of our column, moving slowly and awkwardly. The door was heavy and so was I. No one had an arm free. Even more men poured out of the door, swords in hand.

I was lying on my left side. I had a tiny sonic weapon clapped to the sticky patch on my leg, but the officer on the right-hand corner had a much bigger effort in a holster on his hip. I reached over, doing myself an enormous amount of hurt, pulled it free, aimed, and fired past him.

I heard nothing but something certainly happened.

The leaders stopped and staggered. One put his hands on his knees and began to vomit. Red wine by the looks of it. The others appeared to lose their balance and sat down suddenly. One turned and ran full tilt into the door jamb, hitting it so hard that he knocked himself unconscious and brought a hail of dust and small stones down on top of him.

‘Nice,’ said the Time Police officer appreciatively. ‘Tell me again about treating hostile contemporaries like fragile flowers.’

It hurt to speak, but in a low drone between short, shallow breaths, I told him to go forth and multiply.

We ditched my door outside the pod and thundered up the ramp which hissed shut behind us, shutting out the noise of a dying city. They lowered me gently and covered me with a blanket. I stretched out on the cold floor and tried to see what was going on.

There were only people’s boots. I could hear the medical teams, urgent but calm. Requests for drugs, instruments, readings. Bloody swabs fell to the floor like a colourful blizzard. The occasional instrument tinkled.